Join us for a Guest Seminar with Dr Linda Steele, Associate Professor University of Technology Sydney, hosted by the Centre for Mental Health Practice, Policy and Law Research at Edinburgh Napier University.

Article 19 of the Convention on the Rights of Persons with Disability provides for the right to live independently and be included in the community. The UN Committee on the Rights of Persons with Disabilities (CRPD) clarifies this right requires States parties to undertake deinstitutionalisation which extends to providing ‘remedies, reparations, and redress’ for institutionalisation, including through establishment of truth commissions. 

Dr Steele argues for development of a Disability Truth and Repair Framework to support future design and critical evaluation of truth commissions on disability institutions. The presentation maps out a series of conceptual and practical considerations that can inform a framework, by reference to philosophical scholarship on moral repair scholarship and critical disability studies scholarship on institutions. Considerations include temporal, familial, and cultural dynamics of institutionalisation, connections between institutionalisation and other dynamics of oppression and settler colonialism, professional, government, and charity power, and diversity of lived experience and accessibility needs.

This event will be of interest to people with lived experience of mental disabilities, their carers, supporters and families, health and social care professionals, policymakers, legislators, lawyers and the judiciary, academics and students.

About the speaker:

Dr Linda Steele is an Associate Professor with the Faculty of Law at University of Technology Sydney. She is currently leading a program of research 'Truth Justice Repair' through which she explores how we reckon with and repair the harms associated with violence, institutionalisation and segregation of disabled people. Dr Steele is particularly interested in truth-telling, reparations, sites of conscience, and reparative pedagogies. 

About the Centre for Mental Health Practice, Policy and Law Research

The solutions to addressing real life challenges associated with achieving and maintaining good mental health and supporting persons living with mental ill-health and capacity issues require multi-disciplinary and integrated approaches. The Centre for Mental Health Practice, Policy and Law Research, at Edinburgh Napier University, brings together researchers and stakeholders through research, learning and consultancy to inform and influence the realisation of everyone’s right to enjoy the highest attainable standard of mental health throughout their lifespan and the capabilities to achieve this during normal times and national emergency. 

Attendance at this event is free, but you must register to attend.

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